How Do You Connect with a “Season of Joy” When You’re Not Happy?

“I punched my husband,” a friend confided recently. “I asked him to watch the kids for 10 minutes so I could take a shower before Rosh Hashanah started. Instead, he played a game on his phone while the kids pulled everything off the beautiful table I had set, and broke my favorite vase. I told the kids to go watch something and punched my husband in the back.”

Ouch.

Her favorite vase and a beautifully-set table.

Oh, and a sore husband. Though, in case you can’t tell, it’s hard for me to feel sympathy for that slouch.

For a year-and-a-half, I’ve been privy to the pains of some friends as they’ve struggled with being married and raising children in a pandemic that, let’s face it, has the potential to bring out the worst in others. Some controlling people became more controlling; some angry people became angrier. And yes, some slouches became slouchier.

At a critical time in the Jewish calendar that’s described as “Z’man Simchateinu” (“the season of our joy”), how do we access happiness, or at least, a semblance of peace, when we feel unhappy?

I’m not a naturally happy person; I’m a grouch. In fact, I can often be the human version of Sesame Street’s lovable character, Oscar the Grouch, if Oscar decorated his trash can with Persian rugs and crystal chandeliers.

I’m not a naturally happy person; I’m a grouch. In fact, I can often be the human version of Sesame Street’s lovable character, Oscar the Grouch, if Oscar decorated his trash can with Persian rugs and crystal chandeliers.

Personally (and despite the fact that I’m modern Orthodox and take the commandment to be happy during this season seriously), I’ve always found “Z’man Simchateinu” to espouse some pressure and overly high expectations—expectations I can never seem to meet as I sit in a sukkah and grumble about being too hot (or too cold), and pull a child’s adorable drawing off the fragile sukkah wall to slap a mosquito dead. Like I said, I’m a grouch.

But I don’t want to be grouchy. In my heart, I build an altar to the singularly most-desired, yet most unattainable treasure for which human beings have yearned for millennia: inner peace. And yes, some happiness.

I also believe that shalom bayit (“peace in the home”) is the inarguable foundation of the whole world. Entire lives are saved (or ruined) by it, including those of children; even wars can start (or end) because of it (one day, I’ll be able to prove this).

Think about it this way: how does a person function as a partner, friend, worker, or any other member of society if he or she lives in a state of miserable tension at home? Yes, most people try to remain professional and leave their home life at home, but we’re all human, and the reverberations of a distinct lack of shalom bayit are everywhere and touch nearly everything. If a teacher is fighting with her husband at home, her students might see the pain on her face. If a male world leader feels like an inadequate, disrespected husband and father, you better believe that his citizens will feel the reverberations of that, too, in his tyrannical rule. Like a perpetual seesaw, when shalom bayit is missing, the balance of the world itself shifts into a state where the forces of darkness overtake light. In fact, without shalom bayit, there can be no shalom olam (“peace in the world”).

Judaism seems obsessed with shalom bayit, sparing no effort to secure it.

Judaism seems obsessed with shalom bayit, sparing no effort to secure it. The Talmud argues, “Great is peace between husband and wife.” When Sarah tells God that her husband, Abraham, is “too old” to have children, God actually omits these words when he retells the conversation to Abraham, as a way to preserve peace between husband and wife (Genesis: 18:12-13). Isn’t that remarkable? Meanwhile, I can’t even ask my husband for a clean kitchen towel without reminding him that he didn’t wash the load of delicates properly.

“Anyone struggling to feel joy in their life, especially around relationship struggles, needs to face the truth about what’s causing them pain,” Rabbi Dov Heller, who’s also a licensed therapist, told me. “They need to stop trying to rationalize or blame others for their pain, but to face it head-on and take complete responsibility for the situation, rather than continuing to suffer.” Heller added, “The irony is that people often choose to suffer with the pain they have, rather than take on the pain of change, which is often very scary because it’s unknown territory.”

He’s right. Changing your perception of things or the way you respond to conflict is painfully hard. But it is achievable. Changing someone else, however, is impossible.

“I’m not a therapist, but I can imagine many disagreements are rooted in our egos,” my friend, Eman Esmailzadeh, who co-founded Bayit.LA, said. Bayit.LA is devoted to improving the family lives of local Jewish couples through workshops, classes and one-on-one learning based on compassion and Jewish values. To date, it has engaged over 100 couples pre-marriage, offering tools and answering many questions. Its workshops have reached over 1,000 people.

“Sukkot is a time of year that reminds us how humble we should be,” Esmailzadeh continued. “Once a year, we are called to leave our safe, air-conditioned, concrete structures and to humbly take shelter in a temporary hut with a roof that allows the visibility of the stars. And though every strife is unique, many fights and disagreements will be better served with a healthy dose of reminding ourselves that our existence itself is not eternal.”

What a profound thought: Our existence, and therefore, our conflicts, resentments and bitter disappointment over others’ behavior is temporary as well, no matter how raw or painful it currently feels.

It seems, then, that pain and happiness exist as part of a seesaw, too. And they have one thing in common: neither lasts forever. But when we do experience happiness, we should welcome it as a true season of joy.

For more information on Bayit.LA, visit www.bayit.la

Tabby Refael is a Los Angeles-based writer, speaker, and civic action activist. Follow her on Twitter @RefaelTabby